RALEIGH, N.C. - Doc Watson, a Grammy-winning folk musician whose lightning-fast style of flat picking influenced guitarists worldwide, died yesterday, according to his manager and a hospital spokeswoman. He was 89.

Watson, blind from age 1, died at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, where he was hospitalized recently after falling at his home in Deep Gap, in the Blue Ridge Mountains.He underwent abdominal surgery while in the hospital and was deemed in critical condition for several days.

The flat picking of Arthel "Doc" Watson helped make the case for the guitar as a lead instrument in the 1950s and '60s, when it was often considered a backup for the banjo, fiddle or mandolin.His playing, grandson Richard Watson said in a 2000 interview with the Associated Press, had a humbling effect on others."Everybody who's picked with you says you intimidate them, and that includes some of the best," Richard Watson told him.

"An old ancient warrior has gone home," country and bluegrass singer Ricky Skaggs said last night."He prepared all of us to carry this on. He knew he wouldn't last forever. He did his best to carry the old mountain sounds to this generation."Doc Watson was born on March 3, 1923, in Deep Gap, about 100 miles northwest of Charlotte. He lost his sight when he developed an eye infection worsened by a congenital vascular disorder, according to a website for Merlefest, an annual musical gathering named for his deceased son, Merle.

He was given a harmonica as a child and was playing the banjo by age 5, the Merlefest site says. He learned a few guitar chords while attending the North Carolina Morehead School for the Blind in Raleigh, and his father helped him buy a Stella guitar for $12.

He got his musical start in 1953, playing electric lead guitar in a country-swing band.Then, in 1960, Ralph Rinzler - a musician who managed Bill Monroe - discovered Watson in North Carolina. The road to fame took him to the Newport (R.I.) Folk Festival in 1963 and his first recording contract a year later.Seven of his 60 albums won Grammys; he was awarded a Grammy for lifetime achievement in 2004.He received the National Medal of Arts in 1997.

"There may not be a serious, committed baby boomer alive who didn't at some point in his or her youth try to spend a few minutes at least trying to learn to pick a guitar like Doc Watson," President Bill Clinton said at the time.

Countless guitarists tried to emulate his renditions of songs such as Deep River Blues, Shady Grove and Tennessee Stud. Merle, who had begun recording and touring with his father in 1964, died at 36 in a 1985 tractor accident.Watson, in deep grief, considered retirement. Instead, he started the event in Wilkesboro, N.C., that raises money for a community college there.

Besides his son, whom he called the best friend he would ever have, he relied on Rosa Lee, whom he married in 1947.

"She saw what little good there was in me, and there was little," Watson told the AP in 2000. "I'm awful glad she cared about me, and I'm awful glad she married me."

In a PBS NewsHour interview before a January appearance in Arlington, Va., Watson said he still enjoyed touring.

"I love music and love a good audience, and still have to make a living," he said. "Why would I quit?"

Last year, a life-size statue was dedicated in Boone, N.C., where Watson had played decades earlier for tips to support his family.The inscription, at his request, read, "Just One of the People."

Never miss a story

Choose the plan that's right for you.
Digital access or digital and print delivery.